FairPlay has been impressed by the meticulous methodology used by the South African trade regulator, the International Trade Administration Commission (ITAC) to decide on provisional anti-dumping duties on chicken imports from Brazil and four European Union countries.
The way ITAC has gone about its job is not being reflected in comments by chicken importers and their supporters. Importers are understandably unhappy about the impact the new duties will have on their profits, but the decision by SARS was reached after a very thorough investigation.
As FairPlay founder Francois Baird pointed out in a letter to Business Day, ITAC’s investigation has been thorough and meticulous. The arguments, counter-arguments and reasons for its findings are all published in a 187-page report.
“The regulator reviewed the evidence on dumped chicken imports submitted by the local poultry industry. It then wrote to the countries and poultry producers involved and asked for their detailed submissions, asked the local industry to respond to those submissions and then made its findings.
“It has responded to every argument, often in detail and citing decisions in other countries on anti-dumping applications,” Baird wrote.
While importers and foreign producers are still claiming that there is no evidence of dumping, or of harm caused to the South African poultry industry, ITAC’s report shows that it considered these arguments and rejected them.
“The commission made its provisional determination, unambiguously, that there is sufficient information to indicate that chicken portions were being dumped in South Africa by producers in Brazil, Denmark, Ireland, Poland and Spain, that this had caused material injury to the local industry and threatened to do so in future, and that there was a causal link between the dumping and the injury.” Baird said.
Importers are likely to repeat these claims all of this year, up to and after ITAC’s final determination, which is expected mid-year. That will be accompanied by another detailed exposition of the reasons for its decision.
There will be more claims that dumping is not happening, or harm is unproven, plus a multitude of technical reasons why anti-dumping duties should not be imposed. When these claims are made, the answers will be online, in detail, on ITAC’s website.
